Embarassing injury

I twisted my ankle over the weekend.

That’s it. End of the story.

I was taking out the trash, I stepped off a step that was about six inches high into the gravely area around the trash barrels and I rolled over on my ankle. Oh yeah, then I cussed a bit. Carrie was down in the basement switching the laundry and heard the cussing, so she gets concerned and comes out to see me sitting on the step rubbing my ankle.



“What happened?” she asked.

“Twisted my ankle,” I said.

“How did that happen?” she asked.

“Ummm, walking. Basically just taking a step and not being coordinated enough to handle my own body weight.”

“You weren’t pretending to be superman or doing some weird sort of super hero leap, were you.”

Seriously, I have no idea how she gets some of these ideas in her head. It has been years and years since I have pretended to be a super hero. Okay. It’s at least been months and months since I’ve pretended to be a super hero.

“No,” I said. “Walking.”

“You weren’t storming around having a fit because you were mad about taking out the trash, were you?”

Seriously, I have no idea how she gets some of these ideas in her head. It has been months and months since I’ve had a fit over anything as silly as taking out the trash. Okay, it’s at least been hours and hours since I’ve had a fit over anything as silly as taking out the trash.

“No storming around. Just walking,” I said.

“Because I heard you swearing and slamming things,” she said.

“I’m pretty sure the swearing and slamming came after I twisted my ankle. Walking.”

Over the next day or two, I’m forced to explain my extremely slow and limping gait several more times to friends, family, and coworkers. The story never gets any more exciting.

“What happened to your ankle?”

“Twisted it.”

“How’d that happen?”

“Walking.”

Oddly enough, no one else asks me if I twisted my ankle pretending to be a super hero, although Eric seemed to think that Breezy’s bad back and my twisted ankle were somehow related.

“I thought he might have tripped over Breezy,” he said.

Nope. Just walking. All by myself.

Headline of the day on CNN.com

 'Hippie chimps' fast disappearing as dinner

This headline is so disturbingly awful in its imagery that I am literally afraid to read the story. Seriously. Individually, all of the words make sense together. Mash them altogether, and it's like something out of a Peter Fonda/Jack Nicholson "trip" movie from the sixties.

The headline is enough to give me psychadelic nightmares. I'm afraid reading the story just might put me over the edge.

Smokey and the really slow bandits

You’re driving home on the highway and suddenly, traffic comes to a screeching halt in front of you. You’re thinking there must be a really bad accident, or maybe it’s near Christmas and there’s a traffic tie-up at the exit near the mall.



But no. Instead, everyone has slowed to a crawl because a state trooper has one of your fellow drivers pulled over on the side of the road and we must all slow down so that we don’t get pulled over, too.

Which is really stupid. If ever there was a time to speed on the highway without fear of getting caught, it’s probably when the police are occupied. Do you really think the trooper standing on the side of the road, sidled up to the driverside window of the car he just pulled over is going to suddenly jump in his cruiser and chase you down the highway because you’re doing 67 mph in a 65 mph zone?

“You stay here, Mr. speeding, crack smoking, whiskey drinking, suspected baby seal killing driver, while I chase down these bastards who dare attempt to drive near the speed limit,” the trooper will say.

But there’s little danger of that happening, since the state trooper will be very impressed that no one dares go over 15 mph while he has Mr. speeding, crack smoking, whiskey drinking, suspected baby seal killer pulled over.